Will Campus Cellphone Addicts Ever Learn?

September 16, 2010|Frank Harris III

People say love is good. I say yes, but not all love. Take the average college students' love for their cellphones. Of the many types of love in this world, there is no love greater than college students' love of their cellphones.

But is it good love? I think not — certainly not in the classroom.

As a college professor, I have seen what the love of cellphones can do to students and I can attest to an unmistakable truth: Bright students with smart phones can do dumb things.

Like just last week, after I told the class verbally and in the course syllabus about the new cellphone-free classroom policy — banning the use of cellphones and other electronic devices in classrooms before, during and after class begins — one of my students sitting in the back blurted out there were firetrucks on campus and asked if she could leave class to go check on her personal property.

"How do you know this?" I asked

"My friend just texted me."

I love teaching. Really I do. But academia is under siege with students going ga-ga over their cellphones.

A Ball State University survey of 300 college students found that 99.7 percent of students own a cellphone. That's virtually every college student, which is evident when walking across any college campus. Students are so busy texting and talking into their cellphones they barely see each other.

That Ball State survey also found that 94 percent send text messages and — get this — 62 percent text while they are in class. That is why we instituted the cellphone-free classroom policy — because too many students have gone buck wild over their cellphones to the point that nothing else matters. Cellphones are their life. Pity the fool who misses a phone call. Drag them to hell if they miss a text message.

It's all a major distraction and disruption in the classroom: Someone's phone goes off and the class gets treated to that student's unique musical tastes; a student gets up with a concealed cellphone, walks out the door and into a bathroom where no instructor of the opposite sex can follow; or they sit in the back of the class with their hands out of view texting away. Worse is the student who takes a call during class.

How bad is it? If a cell went overboard, they'd jump right in after it. Many are seemingly addicted to their cellphones like winos clinging to their bottles, or gamblers clinging to their dice. There are students who simply can't or won't turn off their cellphones even when they are given clear instructions about the rationale for doing so and the consequences if they don't.

OK, OK. I should have compassion for them. And I do. It's the tough-love kind of compassion designed to help break them from their reckless behavior.

But is it working?

It's early yet, but I must confess to sometimes looking at my students and their cellphones and thinking of Jack Benny and a certain comedic scenario in which a robber points a gun at him and offers a seemingly easy choice.

Robber: "Your money or your life! "

(Short pause).

Robber: "Look bud! I said your money or your life!"

Jack Benny: "I'm thinking it over!"

Given a choice between their cellphones and a good grade, many college students would not take long to think it over — they'd choose their doggone cellphones.

Perhaps I should work harder, be proactive and offer a new special topics course called Cellphone Anonymous.

Yes! And on the first day, I could get students to stand up, whip out their cellphones and hold them up in the air and say: "Hello, my name is _______________, and I'm a cellular addict!"

Of course, they'd be too busy texting to notice.

Frank Harris III is chairman of the journalism department at Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven. He can be reached at harrisf1@southernct.edu.